KUDOS to Transportation Authority of Marin directors for temporarily scuttling efforts by staff to spend almost $500,000 on consultants.

It was Executive Director Dianne Steinhauser’s proposal to hire a flock of independent contractors to staff the six-month break to reconsider the unpopular TAM-Caltrans $143 million plan to redo a two-mile stretch of Highway 101 between Sir Francis Drake Boulevard and Corte Madera.

Include Corte Madera Mayor Diane Furst and Marin Supervisor Kate Sears among the good guys for taking a lead in stopping this waste.

As disclosed in this column last week, Steinhauser proposed spending $495,000 on the effort. The belief of some in the environmental community is that the end result would be the same Los Angeles-style highway plan with minor tweaks.

Instead, the TAM board agreed to cut the consultants’ budget to $65,000.

The only hitch is that Steinhauser told TAM directors that in just three weeks she’s already spent $115,000 on consultants.

Unless TAM directors stay on top of the piggy bank, don’t be surprised if when all is said and done the revisioning effort ends up costing close to the original half-million.

Given that TAM annually spends nearly $1.2 million on salaries and benefits for its 11 staff members, it’s not out of line to ask TAM’s honcho to require her existing staff to do the necessary work rather than hiring ever more consultants.

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MAY 7 is the least heralded election day in Marin’s 2013 political calendar. No need to look for actual ballot boxes.

This election is part of the very practical trend of ballots to be cast solely by U.S. mail.

Three measures will be decided.

In the San Rafael Elementary School District, voters will face Measure A. It’s a non-controversial extension of the grade schools’ current $203.70 parcel tax for another eight years.

Its companion is Measure B, providing for the same extension of the annual $146.68 parcel tax to fund necessities in San Rafael’s technically separate but administratively coordinated high schools.

Despite the required two-thirds super-majority and an expected light turnout, the two measures should pass.

That’s typical of Marin voters who tend to put their money where their mouth is when it comes to quality education.

The third issue, Measure C, while more controversial, also has an easily predicted result.

It will fail.

Measure C results from grand jury and Marin Local Agency Formation Commission studies showing that four of the tiny independent governments that form the Sewage Agency of Southern Marin should be merged into one elected body.

The theory is that the consolidation would be more efficient, saving money in the long run. No actual workers would be dismissed, though the directors who run the four political fiefdoms would become history.

The 20 elected directors of the admittedly scandal-free Richardson Bay, Homestead Valley, Alto and Almonte sanitary districts are resolutely opposing the notion that they be dumped.

This is the kind of reform measure that stirs few passions other than among the affected directors.

It was set to be an interesting election until LAFCO’s board, with Supervisor Kate Sears casting the deciding vote, set rules for the election making passage a virtual impossibility.

Measure C dies if only a majority of voters in any of the four districts vote “no.” That action took the steam out of good-government types considering an active “Yes on C” campaign since it would obviously be futile.

Sears’ action was a subtle message that county supervisors have little interest in sewage district consolidation.

This election should be the final gasp of efforts to merge any of Marin’s independent sanitary districts.

Columnist Dick Spotswood of Mill Valley now shares his views on local politics twice weekly in the IJ. His email address is spotswood@comcast.net.